Return to flip book view

WHITE PAPERELEVATE CX | EX WELL BEYOND THE CURRENT IT EXPERIENCE MANAGEMENTAPPROACHExperience Management ischallenged in affecting ITsupport’s bottom-line. FlowManagement practices fill the gap.OPTIMAL SUPPORTTEAM PRACTICESUnderstand what isrequired for FlowManagement to beintroduced.SUB-OPTIMALPRACTICEUnderstand whatcan be done to makea big difference evenif Flow Managementis impossible.IMPORTANCEOF THE DIGITALCHANNELSERVICE DESKUnderstand how itpositively affectsexperiences.

IT Experience Management (ITXM) & Paper Overview The ProblemThe Problem & XMThe SolutionTransition to the SolutionSub-Optimal Practice to make ITIL’s process for ticketmanagement work well (community version only)Strategic Objective for “X” # 2 - the Digital ChannelService Desk (community version only)Improvements to ITIL from all Flow ManagementPractices: Summary of FM Outcomes / Value StreamsSECTIONS

Experience Management (XM) is a breakthrough direction forIT Service Management (ITSM). No longer are IT organisationsblinkered to how well they are doing.There are three XM work streams:Collect and analyse experience data.1.Experience improvement.2.Form Experience Level Agreements (XLA’s).3.Experience improvement - better IT service outcomes fromthe customer’s perspective - is the destination and primarypurpose. There is little point in collecting the data and havingan XLA if little or nothing is done about it.ITXM is largely about the quality of IT support, which is thefocus of this White Paper. Discussed are the challengesordinarily faced with improving support compared to FlowManagement (FM) practices that permanently embed optimalservice ticket management, and can be quick to introduce.Also discussed are Flow Management metrics - FlowMetrics for ITSM - and why, even though they are primarilyoperational in nature, organisations might want to includethem to enhance an overall XLA.IT Experience Management(ITXM) & Paper Overview3

General acceptance that ITIL is best practice mightexplain why the process has not been improved beforenow. Regardless, deep-rooted in the status-quo, theprioritisation problem is now feeding through aslargely insurmountable challenges for ExperienceManagement practices looking to meet customerexpectations for reliable, timely service. The ProblemDespite the ITIL best practice framework havingunderpinned ITSM for decades, organisations still sufferfrequently slow and failed support. Being busy is notthe main cause though. It is inadequate prioritisation ofactivity stemming from a process that has not changed.4

The Problem & XMIT experience touches almost all corners of an IT organisation’swork, but because support is IT’s main “arena”, the problem ofinadequate prioritisation and progression of activity is central.Ordinarily, an XM practice must involve managers workingclosely with team members to coach and train the focusnecessary to help overcome the problem, for exampleattention to customer replies, SLA breaches, appropriate andtimely use of on-hold, and attentive handling of chased tickets,alongside other operational improvement areas.To nurture focused effort and behaviour that is unnaturalbecause it sits outside of a standard process, is not easythough. Moreover, the managerial overhead must be ongoing,and it adds significantly to what must be learnt and hopefullymastered by new IT employees during their induction.These challenges mean that best practice set-out by XMframeworks usually includes that improvement to experiencescores should not be stipulated with penalties in an overallExperience Level Agreement. Instead, a service provider mightbe rewarded if a good level of uplift is achieved.For clients of a managed service provider (MSP), this arrangement is not ideal because warranty of goodperformance or outcomes is wanted, not merelyrecognition of it if achieved. So, the tendency might beto stick with traditional SLA’s alongside XLA’s.5

The SolutionThe solution replaces managerial nurture with process-based focus for self-managing teams, and it offers newKPI’s that are suitable for experience warranty in an XLA.Standard Activity Prioritisation (AP) schedules all requiredsupport activity according to progression parameters that asupported business decides are appropriate for specific ticketsituations (statuses), guiding teammates continuously fromone activity to the next with ideal timing.AP drives Flow Management, with organisations enabled tomaintain customer expectations because a ticket’s scheduledtime for progression can be communicated on a service portal.The process is based on motivated teamwork, enablingeveryone in a team to meet needs and expectations almostwithout fail, for upmost customer experience (CX). ITemployee experience (EX) naturally benefits too.Completely unlike traditional time-based metrics, Flow Metricsproduced by the process are wholly accurate and detailed to theextent that they correlate directly with the primary CX factor forsupport: attentiveness. When scheduled progression does nothappen in time and so communicated expectations are not met,the potential CX dip is known.Tap to watch the solution explained...6

The SolutionKPI’s from Flow Metrics that might be included to bringoperational information into an overall XLA, and/ or to givecontext to individual support service experience scores, are:Progression SLA - how often ticket progression time-framesare not met (the overall extent of CX dip).Long Time in Progression Breach (badly degraded CX).Excessive Progression Backlog (snapshot extent of dip).Flow Metrics enable organisations to be moreXLA than SLA, particularly if not phone channelreliant (see the final section to understand theimperative for a Digital Channel Service Desk).Tap to watch the solution explained... 7

Research shows that Flow Management capabilities areexpected to play a substantial part in the future ofsupport and will be an essential requirement for largerorganisations when choosing an ITSM tool -organisations who are more likely to operate XM. The Solution8

* Activity prioritisation requires a license in the USA - free to end-user organisations. Compatibilitymight not be accurate and might include other tools. Please contact Opimise to confirm.9TRANSITION TO THE SOLUTIONimprovement when XM is introduced, or when switchingservice tool.Features and their specification are described in the FocusFramework. The framework is developed and maintained byOpimise, aligned to 20 good practice principles for ITsupport and removal of 21 historic operational issues,leading to Digital Enterprise Service Maturity (DESM).Opimise began developing FM apps in 2020, for “off-the-shelf” installation.Organisations who self-develop the practices can benefitfrom their implementation being checked for adherence tothe framework, to become Flow Verified.The ideal time for introduction isfollowing organisational focus onOptimal Flow Management capabilities can be introduced byany organisation with a compatible ITSM tool*:ServiceNowIvantiJiraBMC

SUB-0PTIMAL PRACTICEOrganisations who do not use and are not moving to a toolcompatible with full-scope Flow Management practices, canstill make a big difference by introducing standard practiceProgression Point Prioritisation (PPP) to make the ITILprocesses for ticket management work properly.Join the Flow Management Community of Practice to learnhow in the extended version of this paper.10

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVE FOR “X” #2By introducing Activity Prioritisation to ensuretimeliness, or at least to put teams in control of the ITILprocess, a big difference is sure to grip CX and EX, forgreater success of any XM practice.A second and related imperative for IT governance is torecognise all of the benefits to be gained, especiallyaround EX, by moving away from call centre reliance - andhow best to do it.Join the Flow Management Community of Practice for thedetail, in the extended version of this paper.11

12Improvements to ITIL from allFlow Management Practices

Previous White Papers by Opimise:“How Flow Metrics improve operational processes and makepermanent work-from-home viable for more teams across theEnterprise”Neither the author, norOpimise, warrant the accuracyof any statement made herein.© 2023. All rights reserved. FlowManagement, Flow Metrics for ITSM. andActivity Prioritisation, are proprietary terms. Contact Us send